


I bet you kiss your knuckles

by narcissablaxk



Series: Now or Never [1]
Category: Cobra Kai (Web Series), Karate Kid (Movies)
Genre: Daniel in glasses, First Kiss, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post All Valley, Season One Finale, Whump, dressing each other's wounds, lawrusso
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-23
Updated: 2020-05-23
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:46:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,688
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24332296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/narcissablaxk/pseuds/narcissablaxk
Summary: John Kreese is here to help take Cobra Kai to the next level. Johnny doesn't want that. He remembers, as he's choking, how Miyagi had saved his life last time Kreese had put him in a headlock. He wished there was someone to save him now.
Relationships: Daniel LaRusso/Johnny Lawrence
Series: Now or Never [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1772686
Comments: 12
Kudos: 313





	I bet you kiss your knuckles

Johnny wasn’t sure when his initial fear in seeing Kreese again shifted to anger. Maybe it was when Kreese indicated that Cobra Kai’s success was down to him, again. Maybe it was when he said the fight had only just begun. Maybe the anger just came back when the shock had worn off; still, Johnny stood in front of his old sensei, trying not to remember the way Kreese’s arm felt around his neck, the way he gasped for breath, the way tears slid down his cheeks when he realized Kreese wasn’t going to let go. 

And then Miyagi had saved him, and things had only gotten worse. 

Sure, Miyagi had saved his life, because Johnny knew, even thirty years later, that Kreese wouldn’t have let go until someone made him, and Miyagi was the only one who could make him, but that also meant Johnny had to watch his hero get knocked off his pedestal. He cowered on the asphalt while Kreese punched out the windows of his car, showering broken glass all over him, Daniel LaRusso’s wide brown eyes watching from afar. 

They’d locked eyes in the aftermath, when Miyagi was pushing him toward his beat up pickup truck, and LaRusso had given him a nod. Something placating, understanding. They wouldn’t be enemies anymore, not after that.

“I thought you were dead,” he said flatly, trying to stay in the present instead of lingering in the past. 

“I’m sure they’d love to think that,” Kreese laughed, low and menacing, and Johnny’s fist clenched, tense at his side. 

“What are you doing here?” he asked, hoping with naïve hope that Kreese would say he was just visiting, came to give him support, something that meant his stay was momentary, and already ending. 

He was never that lucky. “I’m here to help,” Kreese said instead, stepping farther into the dojo. Johnny’s eyes fell to his shoes. Kreese would have knocked him out if he wore shoes on the mat, but here he was, disrespecting Johnny’s dojo like it was the easiest thing in the world. 

“I don’t need your help,” Johnny insisted. 

“What are you saying, Mr. Lawrence?” There was that tone again, the almost teasing, knowing tone that insinuated that Kreese was already several steps ahead, that Johnny could never hope to catch up. “Are you disrespecting your sensei?” 

“You’re not my sensei anymore,” Johnny took a hurried step closer when Kreese did, as if trying to keep him from seeing the rest of the dojo, as if there was more to see. “I don’t want you here.” 

“Yes you do,” Kreese said with a smirk, smug as ever. “You need me here.” 

He was standing almost nose to nose with Johnny, his stupid cigar still poking out of his mouth, the ash tumbling to the ground listlessly, feathers on the wind in the windless room. Johnny could smell him now, alcohol and tobacco and a little bit of the mints he used to pop in his mouth and crack during trainings. His tattoo was faded, and there were more scars on his arm than the last time he’d seen him, but still, here he was. Standing tall. 

It was too maddening to bear. 

How dare Kreese still be standing when so many other people weren’t? Why was Kreese allowed to be alive and still haunt him while his mother was dead? It wasn’t fair. 

He knocked the cigar out of Kreese hand and watched, with satisfaction, as it flew, end over end, toward the knocked over trashcan in the corner of the room. He shoved Kreese back, noting that the man stumbled a step before regaining his balance, and kicked him, hard in the chest. 

He took it was an _“oof,”_ and righted himself almost instantly. Johnny noticed, too late, that even though Kreese did look older, he still looked as solid as he did the day he almost asphyxiated Johnny in the parking lot at the All Valley tournament. 

“That’s how you want to play it, boy?” he asked, his fists rising to protect his face. 

In answer, Johnny swung his fist at him, punching him once, twice, three times in the kidneys. Kreese side-stepped him and realigned his stance, huffing quietly and sending out his heavy fist, catching Johnny around the jaw. 

He wasn’t protecting his face, he knew that now. He could hear Kreese’s voice, from the eighties, in his head. “All offense, no defense, Mr. Lawrence, will get you killed.” He shook his head, trying to get the voice out, but that was an opening that Kreese jumped on. 

He kicked him in the gut, sending Johnny stumbling back another several steps, toward the edge of the mat. Johnny countered, and their fight became a quick flurry of kick, block, punch, block, block, turn, kick, miss. 

Johnny was getting better at predicting Kreese’s moves, or Kreese was telegraphing. He felt, for a moment, satisfied that he had become a better fighter over the years. Until Kreese’s kick caught him in the chest and sent him flying into the mirror, shattered glass falling around him and onto the floor. 

He considered calling the fight there, pretending like this was how manly men like himself and Kreese handled their emotions at a reunion, but the adrenaline in his veins was burning hot, and he pulled himself wearily to his feet and prepared for another round. 

Getting his ass beat repeatedly would be worth it if Kreese would get tired and leave him and his dojo alone. 

And then Johnny went in for a punch and Kreese caught him around the arm, turning him so that he could fit his strong forearm around Johnny’s neck again, tightening his hold. 

They were facing the mirror, Johnny struggling to free himself, his breath coming in short wheezes, Kreese above him, smug, blood just barely leaking from his lip. They were looking back to the eighties, except there was no Miyagi to save him this time. 

He wished there was. 

The cigar in the corner had rolled toward an old All Valley flyer and the other pieces of paper that had tipped out of the plastic trash can, little tendrils of flame growing the longer Johnny watched. It was surreal, staring at his dojo literally go up in flames while his old sensei tightened his old on his neck, black spots appearing in his vision. 

And then he heard the bell at the door ring, and he heard a voice he thought he recognized before he slipped away. 

When he came to, he could hear the sound of a fight. He was pretty sure he was dreaming. No one in their right mind would come to the dojo this late at night, and even fewer of those possible people would enter into a fight with John Kreese. That was just…unthinkable. 

“Do you wish Mr. Miyagi could be here to see this little turn of events?” Kreese’s voice was far away, and Johnny wondered if he was going to pass out again. 

Daniel’s voice was steely, ice cold. “He’d be proud of me, standing up to a bully once again.” 

Kreese laughed, but Johnny could hear that he was hurting under it. “You still think that there are only bullies and victims. There are no bullies and victims. There are just winners and losers.” 

And then Johnny heard the sound of skin hitting skin, a loud thud, and Kreese stopped talking.

He stayed where he was, still taking the time to inhale and exhale, relishing in being able to breathe unencumbered, eyes closed. He wasn’t sure he had the strength to move yet. But every breath made him feel stronger. And then he heard Daniel’s footsteps beside him. 

“Johnny?” his voice was strangled, like he was trying to hold his emotions back. Typical LaRusso, always hysterical. “Johnny, come on.” 

One of his hands pressed softly into his chest, the other tilted his head one way, the better to see him, he guessed. He let him, but only for a few seconds. 

_“John –”_

“Stop saying my name, for the love of God,” Johnny muttered, and his voice was raspy, almost unintelligible. He opened his eyes, and immediately locked gazes with Daniel, who was staring down at him, mouth slightly open, blood sliding down his forehead from a gash he hadn’t had at the All Valley tournament. “I’m alright.” 

“You’re not alright,” Daniel argued. “You were unconscious.” 

Johnny shrugged, the movement jerky and graceless while he was lying on the ground. Daniel glowered down at him, but his hand on Johnny’s chest had tightened into a fist, the other hand on the side of his face soft and limp, almost forgotten. 

“What the _fuck_ was Kreese doing here?” he asked, and Johnny’s eyes left his to find the door, to find wherever Kreese’s body had landed, because that’s what he heard, wasn’t it? Daniel kicking Kreese’s ass? 

“He’s gone,” Daniel said, so softly it sounded like he was comforting him. And it worked, oddly enough, because Johnny let his head fall back onto the mat. 

“Ouch,” he muttered, picking his head up again and rubbing the back of his head, feeling the grainy residue of glass in his hair. 

“There’s glass all over you,” Daniel pointed out. “Come on, let’s get you cleaned up.” 

“I don’t need your help, LaRusso,” Johnny snapped with no heat. Daniel sat back on his haunches, his eyebrows raised, the blood inching down with the movement. Johnny pulled himself to his feet, tentatively feeling for more glass. He straightened up, and then the room tilted again. 

Daniel caught him before he could fall again, his smug gaze saying everything without saying a word. Johnny didn’t add anything. 

He let Daniel lead him to his office, where he gently sat Johnny down on the chair that Miguel usually sat in. He straightened up again, his eyes searching the room surreptitiously. Johnny watched him look, his business clothes all rumpled, his sleeves still rolled up. His forearms were tanned and tight, the veins prominent. Johnny wanted to make a joke about the Hulk, some character that Miguel introduced him to, but his head hurt too much for that. 

“First aid kit is behind the desk,” he offered when Daniel couldn’t seem to find what he was looking for. 

“Thank you,” Daniel muttered, moving behind the desk and coming back with the little white box.

“Why are you here again?” 

Daniel’s eyes lifted from the box and caught Johnny’s gaze again. There was still fire there, a rage that fighting Kreese hadn’t yet extinguished, that Johnny found fascinating. Then he saw something in Johnny’s face that softened him, and the rage was gone. 

“I came to tell you that I talked to Robby, and he wants to have dinner with you,” he said nonchalantly, turning away from Johnny and pulling out some gauze. “He wants to give you another chance.” 

“Don’t fuck with me, LaRusso,” Johnny replied as Daniel pulled another chair up, so close that his knees were pressed into Johnny’s. 

“I’m not,” he shrugged. “I came by to tell you, and then I saw Kreese…” he paused, and there was the rage again, hot and consuming, in his eyes. He clenched his jaw tightly and took a deep breath. 

“You can be angry,” Johnny said softly. “You’re not…disparaging Miyagi’s memory if you let yourself get angry.” 

“I thought he was going to kill you,” Daniel said plaintively, the corners of his mouth pulled down into a frown that looked more sad than angry. 

Johnny shrugged, trying for a joke. “That would have solved a lot of your problems, LaRusso.” 

“Fuck you, Johnny,” Daniel snapped back. “Did you invite him here?” 

“Of course I didn’t invite him here,” Johnny replied, wishing he could scoot back, could move away from Daniel’s penetrating gaze. “I told you he was dead. I thought he was dead.” 

“Clearly he isn’t,” Daniel muttered, and then he squinted, leaning closer. Johnny resisted the urge to back away. “I think you’ve got a little piece of glass stuck…” he trailed off, moving to the very edge of his chair, so that his knees were pressed to the insides of Johnny’s thighs, with nowhere else to go. “Hold on.” 

He leaned back, and Johnny let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding, and pulled a pair of black rimmed glasses out of his breast pocket. How they hadn’t been broken in his fight with Kreese, and how Johnny hadn’t noticed them before, was unknown. He slid them on, and moved back to where he had been before, so close Johnny could smell him, expensive cologne and a little bit like the leather of his new car. 

The glasses only magnified his eyes, and the soft, intoxicating warmth he found there, except when he was focusing on such a minute part of Johnny’s face, Johnny was free to observe him without fear of reprisal. 

He didn’t look like a threat anymore, not with glasses, Johnny thought. He wanted to call him a nerd, that he was wearing dorky fucking glasses, but there was something about the glasses that made Daniel look less like his grown up rival and more like a thoughtful, educated adult.

“What?” Daniel asked, leaning back to grab something from the kit. 

“ _What_ what?” Johnny asked sharply, taking deep breaths of untouched, untainted air that didn’t smell like Daniel. “What are you doing to me now?” 

“I need tweezers,” Daniel muttered. “There’s a piece of glass in the bridge of your nose.” 

“Leave it,” Johnny shrugged. “It’ll come out.” 

Daniel glared at him over the rim of his glasses, which had slipped to the edge of his nose. Johnny felt the air slip out of the room and swallowed thickly. He needed Daniel to take those glasses off, immediately. 

“What’s wrong with you?” Daniel asked. “Are you going to pass out again?” 

Johnny jerked backward, bumping his head on the wall behind him. “What? Come on, LaRusso, don’t be ridiculous.” 

“I’m not,” Daniel had retrieved his tweezers and was moving back to his seat, his gaze still insistently on Johnny with concern. “You really look like you’re going to fall over.” 

“Just shut up and take the glass out of my face,” Johnny muttered, and Daniel obliged, sighing and leaning back into Johnny’s space. 

Johnny watched him lean in, his stomach tight, and when he couldn’t stand to look at him anymore, closed his eyes and waited for it to be over. It would be easier, wouldn’t it, to deal with Daniel if he couldn’t see him? 

He felt Daniel’s hand gently brush his jaw, letting him know he was there, and then his hand took a firm hold of the side of his face, his fingers just barely buried in his hair. Johnny could feel the blood hammering in his ears. He wondered if Daniel could feel his pulse. 

“I’m going to try to take the glass out now,” Daniel whispered, and Johnny’s eyes opened, catching Daniel in the act of scrutinizing Johnny’s face with abandon, clearly relishing in the opportunity to take him in without being caught, as Johnny had done to him earlier. “Is that okay?” 

“That’s what you’re here for, isn’t it?” Johnny tried to retort, but his voice came out breathless and soft. 

Daniel smiled like he noticed, and lifted the tweezers. Johnny closed his eyes again, waiting for the pain that was sure to come. 

It was all over in a moment, and when Daniel pulled away, Johnny wished he could call him back. There was something about being that close that turned them into different people, more likeable people. 

“Alright, I got it,” he said, showing Johnny the chunk of glass. It didn’t look as small as Daniel had said, but he couldn’t feel any blood on his nose, so Johnny took it as a win. “Other than that bruise coming in on your neck, the rest of you looks alright.” 

That meant their time together was coming to an end. Even though Johnny usually wished Daniel out of his sight the moment he saw him, the idea of him leaving now was unbearable. 

“Okay, your turn,” he said hurriedly, standing up from his seat so fast he was immediately chest to chest with Daniel, who had been taking his glasses off. Daniel looked up at him, his eyes wide. He inhaled, and Johnny could feel his chest pressing into him, a gentle push in the right direction. 

“Me?” Daniel asked. “What’s wrong with me?” 

Johnny scoffed. “You’ve got blood on your face, LaRusso, did you not know that?” 

He indicated the chair, pushing Daniel into it when he didn’t move. Daniel allowed himself to be moved, looking up at Johnny from the chair in bewilderment. He looked good. 

He wished he could tell him that, but that wasn’t possible. That wasn’t what they did. Daniel wouldn’t understand anyway. 

Instead, he just took his seat and pulled the chair as close as possible to Daniel, relishing in the dark red flush that crept up his neck when Johnny’s knee pressed to the inside of his thigh.

“What’s wrong, LaRusso?” Johnny asked, unable to help himself. “Nervous?” 

Daniel chuckled, his Adam’s apple bobbing anxiously. He didn’t answer, and Johnny busied himself with getting his own piece of gauze and a few butterfly stitches from the box. He cleaned the blood easily, now that it had dried, and wiped it with an alcohol swab. 

Daniel hissed and moved away from it, but Johnny caught his cheek, two of his fingers splayed onto his neck. “Don’t move,” he commanded. Daniel froze at the feeling of his hand on his neck and obliged, staring at Johnny trustingly, without question. 

“My kid really wants to have a meal with me?” Johnny asked to fill the tightly coiled silence. Daniel’s eyes shimmered a bit, like he was really excited, and Johnny stopped wiping clean the wound to watch him, his hand still on his cheek. 

“I told him that the reason you and I don’t like each other is because of what someone else did,” Daniel admitted. “That you had a really bad teacher that you trusted. Who took advantage of your trust. It’s hard to come back from that. He seemed to understand and said that he’d be interested in listening to what you had to say.” 

Johnny wanted to ask why Daniel would tell his son so many intimate details of his time with Kreese, but he already knew the answer. Daniel was trying to help him, and with Daniel, the best way to help anyone was always to tell the truth. 

“I’m sorry about what Miguel pulled in the tournament,” Johnny muttered, turning away from Daniel for a moment to grab the butterfly stitches. “He’s going to get his ass kicked on Monday. With words,” he added quickly. “I didn’t teach him to do shit like that.” 

Daniel didn’t respond, but watched as Johnny carefully took his hand back to unwrap one of the little stitches. He pressed it over the wound, his eyes catching Daniel as he winced. He could see the glasses poking out of the front of his shirt. He pressed another one to the other end of the wound. 

“When did you start wearing glasses?” he asked, trying to sound nonchalant. Daniel studied him for a moment, a quizzical look on his face. “I’ve never seen you with them.”

“Just for reading,” Daniel shrugged. “Close up stuff. I’ve had them about five years or so. They make me feel old.” 

“Put them on again,” Johnny said, leaning back in the chair, the stitches in place and his job done. 

“What?” Daniel asked, laughing. “Why?” 

“Put them back on, LaRusso,” Johnny insisted. “Because I said so.” 

Daniel stared at him, like he wanted to ask who had body snatched him, but something on Johnny’s face stopped him. Instead, he slowly took out the glasses and put them back on, holding up his hands in mock surrender when he was finished. 

“What’s the big deal?” he asked, but he was grinning now, like he knew what the damn big deal was, and he was enjoying himself. Johnny wanted to tease him, to rile him up like he usually did (it’s what he was really good at, after all), but found he had no energy. Instead, he pulled Daniel to his feet and caught his lips before Daniel could say anything else. 

Johnny always imagined kissing Daniel LaRusso would be hard, punishing, and definitely following a fight (that he would win). He was so very wrong. Daniel wasn’t rough, wasn’t mean. He was _soft,_ and almost delicate. Johnny tilted his head to get a better angle and Daniel followed, their communication in kissing almost as good as their communication in a fight. 

He should have known it would be this good based on the way they fought. 

Daniel pulled back, his eyes bright, and exhaled sharply, like he was trying to get his breath back. Johnny let him, content to just observe Daniel’s face with his glasses on. 

“So you like these,” Daniel said, smugly, pointing to his glasses. 

“Shut up, LaRusso,” Johnny shot back, pulling him in for another kiss, this one hungry and messy. Daniel met him easily, returning everything he got with a vengeance. 

“Stop it, you’re smudging the lenses,” Daniel protested, pulling away, giving Johnny unadulterated access to his throat. Johnny reached behind him, shoving Daniel’s chair out of the way so he could better pin him to the wall. Daniel let him, letting out a breath when his shoulders hit the wall. “John, I’m taking these glasses off.”

“Don’t you dare,” Johnny growled against his skin. “Keep them on.” 

“Make me,” Daniel hissed, his voice breathy and shaky.

Johnny pulled back far enough to raise his eyebrows at him. Daniel started laughing. 

“No, that’s not what I meant,” he stammered. “Don’t make me.” 

“No take backs,” Johnny said, grabbing Daniel’s legs and pulling them up to hook around his waist. “We’ll take it to the mat, LaRusso. See who wins.”


End file.
